In recent years, skateboards have gained increasing popularity not only for sports and recreational purposes but for some occupations as well. For instance, messengers and couriers are using skateboards rather than other modes of transportation, and waiters and waitresses in outdoor restaurants and similar facilities are also finding it more convenient to use skateboards to quickly move about. Frequently these skateboards are used in the evening or at night when due to poor visibility there is greater likelihood of accidents and injuries resulting from their use. In order to make the device, and hence the person riding thereon, safely visible, it has been proposed to use an illuminating device in conjunction with the skateboard. Thus, U.S. Pat. No. 4,336,573 discloses an illuminated skateboard comprising a person carrying platform under which is a pair of axles supported from the platform and rolling wheels engaged thereon. A power source is disposed on the bottom surface of the platform and is operatively connected to a light source so as to illuminate the wheels of the skateboard. The wheels are made from translucent material in order to transmit the light generated by the power source along the outer faces of the wheels.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,094,372 discloses a motorized skateboard whereby the skateboard becomes a self-propelled device. The motorized skateboard described in said patent, however, is not equipped with an illuminating means.
Also, in skateboards which have heretofore been in common use, the riding platform is usually rotated by the rider by pressing one or both feet on the upper surface of the riding platform and manipulating the platform into different degrees of rotation. This, however, requires great force and skill and is frequently laborious and tiresome to the rider.